


The Haunting in Shimada Castle

by VoidGhost



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ghosts, Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, Ghost Hunters, Kinda, M/M, buzzfeed unsolved au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-26
Updated: 2019-01-25
Packaged: 2019-10-16 08:53:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,351
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17546531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VoidGhost/pseuds/VoidGhost
Summary: Jesse McCree is a cameraman for Overwatch's newest show 'Overwatch Unsolved'. He assists them on a particular outing to Shimada Castle, where it is said the ghosts of the infamous Shimada brothers still haunt the grounds.Unbeknownst to the two hosts, Jesse has a more personal reason to be there.





	The Haunting in Shimada Castle

**Author's Note:**

> A small idea I had. Might continue one day! Can you tell I've been watching Buzzfeed Unsolved? c:
> 
> Enjoy!

He knew this area of Japan had a colder climate than what he was used to, but that didn’t keep him from complaining while he set up the camera in front of the bell monument.

“Can’t you do this part  _ inside _ the castle?” Jesse asked, his fingers growing cold as they thumbed through the camera controls. He grouched to himself for forgetting gloves. 

Hana laughed. “Do you  _ see  _ that view?” She pointed to the city line and bright blue sky that served as a background of the bell, and well, it was a pretty sight. “Besides, we’re saving the castle for last.” 

“Right, something about a sword?” Jesse was half-listening as he tried to white balance the camera. Watching the small screen projecting the lens’ view, it became important to get the sky as blue as possible. 

“It’s a shrine dedicated the younger Shimada brother,” Lúcio said, reading through their script. “Dates back at least a hundred years ago. Set up originally by his older brother.” 

“Didn’t his brother kill him?” Satisfied with the white balance, Jesse then adjusted the lighting. They brought his LED stand lights, but when they’re outside in broad daylight, there’s little use for them. The actual problem Jesse faced right now was having  _ too  _ much light. He couldn’t make out any detail on Hana’s face. 

“That’s the twist,” Lúcio explained. He flipped to another part of the script. “The older brother  _ did  _ kill him, but may have been regretful for it. Hence, the shrine.” 

“A little late to take that back.” Jesse had dimmed the lighting to a point where neither of their faces became flat, without losing any detail of the background. Luckily, they were in the shade of some frankly beautiful cherry blossoms that nearly did the work for him.

“It is,” Hana agreed with a chuckle. “They say the murdered brother was angry over his death and haunted his family. The shrine might also have been an attempt to appease his spirit.” 

“Deep stuff.” Finally satisfied, Jesse turned his attention to the mics. He waved Lúcio over, who was the more bouncy host, and stayed patiently still as Jesse tucked a lav mic under his shirt. Jesse wondered just how long until he started to fidget.

“There’s lots of ridiculous theories about it,” Hana said, tapping away on her phone. “And about the Shimadas in general. People think they had ‘spirit dragons’--” 

“It’s a perfectly logical theory!” Lúcio argued, looking over his shoulder at Hana and dislodging the taped lav mic. He offered an apologetic ‘oops’ at Jesse’s flat stare. Thirty seconds.

“Logical?” Hana laughed. “ _ Spirit dragons  _ are logical?” 

“It could be!” Lúcio argued as Jesse fixed the mic back in place. “Magic was known to exist at one point! And the Shimadas worshipped spirits. They said that their ancestors would take the shape of dragons and aid them in life. And you know what’s seen a lot by the locals here?” Lúcio waited until Jesse raised an eyebrow at him. He grinned. “ _ Spirit dragons _ .” 

“You’re so gullible.” Hana ignored Lúcio’s indignant cry in favor of tapping something out on her phone. Luckily, when Lúcio jerked her way, Jesse was done with the mic. 

“Hana, you’re next,” Jesse said, prepping the next lav. “You said ‘dragons’. Are there multiple dragons seen here?” 

As Hana approached, pocketing her phone, Lúcio looked delighted at the question. “Exactly! People have seen a blue  _ and _ a green dragon on the castle grounds.” 

“So both brothers haunt the castle?” Jesse fixed the mic on Hana the same as he did with Lúcio. Hana, the more patient of the two, kept still as Jesse taped the mic down. 

“That’s what some legends say,” Lúcio said, clapping his hands together as he went into education mode. “No one really knows how the older brother died, but it’s said he haunts the castle and warns those who approach of his vengeful younger brother.” 

“Hopin’ to get scared off by some big spirit dragon?” Jesse asked, waving Hana away once he was satisfied with the mic. 

“That’s the dream,” Hana said lackadaisical, throwing a fist in the air. 

“Alright, you folks ready?” Jesse said, angling the camera on the tripod. He directed where each host would stand: either side of the bell monument with the city and bright sky behind them. The picture cut off just above their waists, neither lav mics were exposed, and Jesse would pat his own back for such a beautiful scene. 

“And, action.” Jesse hit the record button. 

The two hosts of  _ Overwatch Unsolved _ burst into an introduction. Jesse didn’t pay much attention; he’d been fed most of the details already. He instead made sure the camera was focused properly as Lúcio and Hana read through their lines. 

They would cut a lot of this footage with images of the supposed ghosts haunting the castle grounds. Jesse had done a bit of his own research regarding the area. The property was owned by Akande Ogundimo, who bought the property and opened it up to visitors in the last decade. Before that, it was passed to descendants of the Shimadas who wanted little to do with the property. To Jesse, they seemed to think it was a stain on their family history. Akande had said that it took convincing to even broach the subject with the family, when they talked to him over a phone call last week. He was more than happy to allow them to visit here if it meant more publicity. 

Jesse was only here for the experience. He wasn’t officially part of  _ Overwatch _ : a company that specialized in media and ran multiple online shows. He was supposed to be a temp that stayed a lot longer only because they valued his talents. He had the opportunity to say no for this particular job, but he had his own interest in the topic.

Jesse had a respect for the dead. It was something valued in his family since he was young; his family had an  _ ofrenda  _ for all his ancestors, and he took joy in participating in  _ Dia de los Muertos _ every year. 

Which is why he hated the feeling this place gave him from the moment he step foot on the property. 

Akande had no such respect. Granted, it wasn’t his family, but that was no excuse for making this sacred castle a public spectacle. There was a reason the Shimada family kept the property under lock and key, and that was to not tread on already restless graves. 

Yet, Jesse had said yes to this job anyway. And, unfortunately, it was not to give Akande his opinion. 

Lúcio clapped, getting Jesse’s attention. “I think we’re done here. Should we wander around a bit and then do the castle?” 

Hana nodded. “Let’s get some B-roll of the cherry blossoms. There’s a couple smaller buildings we could check out, too.” 

“Can do,” Jesse said, unhooking the camera from the tripod and looping the mic cables over his shoulder. 

He followed the two hosts around the property and did as he was told. There were some beautiful cherry blossoms that he found enjoyable to film. The property itself was a gorgeous sight. Traditional buildings that appeared as if they were built in the last year, a clean pathway as if it was recently sweeped, and it seemed like someone lit candles in the windows. 

Jesse paused. Rubbed at his eyes. 

There were no candles. The pathways were sweeped, but not as frequently, and the wood was clearly cracking and missing in some corners where it hadn’t been replaced yet. 

Jesse hummed to himself. 

“Eastwood, over here!” 

Lúcio and Hana were on a balcony, overlooking the cliffside of the castle. Down far below was a grove of trees, but that wasn’t what held the attention of the two hosts. Both knelt in front of a wall, where a deep groove was nestled in the wood. 

Lúcio ran his hand over it. “This balcony was where the brothers had their bloody fight. I wonder if this was a mark left behind from it.” 

At this, Hana seemed equally interested. Ghosts aside, there was history in these walls. 

Jesse got a shot of the two examining the mark in the wall, though he doubted it would make it in the final cut. Luckily the editing part wasn’t his job. As he did so, he felt as if something flew past his ear at an alarming rate and concerningly close. He couldn’t help a hitch in his breath. At that trajectory, whatever it was should have landed into the wall the two hosts were examining.

But there was nothing, of course. 

Lúcio bounced up, excited. “Let’s do the castle next. There’s a mural that I’d love to get a shot of.” 

Jesse took the next ten minutes to get a decent shot of the mural. It was high on the wall and difficult to see from the ground level, but he didn’t trust most of the balcony areas when the wood under their feet already creaked dangerously. 

The mural itself was a work of art. Faded from its age, it once depicted two dragons, and was most likely the origin of the blue and green dragon ghosts that supposedly appeared on the grounds. Similar dragons in the mural circled one another, at peace. 

Then it was time to get to the main event. Jesse set up their foldable chairs in front of the shrine - blocked off by rope with a red sign stating ‘DO NOT TOUCH’ - and set up the tripod again. He needed the stand lights this time, and was thankful for battery power. There was no electricity in the castle that he was aware of, and sunlight didn’t reach this far. Once he was satisfied with the lighting, he gave the two hosts their cue.

“Now we’ll run through the theories out there,” Lúcio said, his hands animated as he spoke. “As we know, the older Shimada son and heir to the family empire, Hanzo, murdered his younger brother, Genji, in supposedly cold blood. But there’s evidence to suggest other possibilities. Theory one: Genji didn’t die.” 

Hana burst out into laughter. Jesse had a hard time keeping his smirk to himself.

“I’ll explain!” Lúcio insisted, smiling. 

“Please do.” 

“So, this was like, a hundred years ago, so determining someone as dead could have resulted in a false positive. Maybe, and this is a just a theory, but maybe Genji wasn’t actually dead. People think he survived his injuries and hunted his brother down to seek revenge.” 

“I don’t think that’s it,” Hana argued. 

“But no one really knows how Hanzo died!” 

“So? It’s definitely not at the hands of his brother that he murdered.” Hana shook her head to further drive her point. 

“Fine, fine. Theory two: Genji killed his brother.” 

“We just talked about that?” 

“But I mean, as a ghost.” 

“Oh. No.” 

Lúcio laughed. “What do you mean no?”

“I mean ghosts aren’t real, so no.” Hana seemed entirely unperturbed by this. She waved her hand. “Next.” 

“Okay, okay. Theory three: Hanzo didn’t actually kill Genji.” 

Hana perked up. “I’m listening.” 

“There could’ve been a third party that we don’t know about,” Lúcio explained. “That had a hand in murdering Genji and pinned it on Hanzo. Then someone decided to take revenge for the prince and killed the wrong guy.” 

Hana nodded along. “I think that’s plausible.” 

As the two hosts continued to debate about the fates of the two Shimadas brothers, all Jesse had to do was make sure the camera didn’t stop recording. He leaned back in his own foldable chair and looked around. 

The shrine was as described: a box with a faded Shimada symbol on the front stood center with a sword displayed on top of it. A banner with some faded Japanese lettering couldn’t be read with Jesse’s untrained eyes. The banner was sliced up one side, and stained with what Jesse presumed to be blood. 

There was a marking in a wooden post beside the shrine that Jesse narrowed his eyes at. Possibly damage from a visitor, but something in Jesse told him it was old. He blinked, and a shuriken appeared, sunken in the wood, glinting in the stand lights. 

He blinked again and it was gone. 

“I think that’s all we need to cover,” Lúcio said, clapping his hands together. “Now it’s time for what you’ve been waiting for.” He sighed, a grimace of dread on his face. 

Hana grinned into the camera. “Let’s get ready to  _ spend the night! _ ”

There were sleeping bags in the back of the van that they brought into the main part of the castle. Since there was already a chill in the air, they packed a space heater and set it up in the area they planned to spend the night in. Jesse, luckily, was able to skip out on that part.  _ Overwatch _ provided a hotel room for him just across the street from the castle. 

He set up the night vision cameras in two corners of the castle, and just as night set in, the two hosts decided to play with a static box and an ouija board. Jesse watched from behind the main camera as neither methods showed any feasible results, even as Hana antagonized the spirits. 

“Hey Genji, if you’re still moping around here,  _ fucking prove it _ ,” Hana said to the spirit box, after the past five minutes showed no end to the loud static. 

“Don’t anger them!” Lúcio at least, seemed afraid to disrespect the dead. But Jesse knew that, antagonizing the spirits or not, these two had a small chance of ever meeting what they’re looking for. 

The static box made a sound, a light feminine voice that sounded like a single syllable. Lúcio gasped. Hana raised an eyebrow. Jesse rolled his eyes. 

Spirit boxes are only radios that pick up noise from various stations, without locking on to a single channel. That was most likely some woman on a radio station talking about the weather. 

“Maybe it was someone else Hanzo murdered!” Lúcio said, face aghast in realization. 

“He wasn’t a serial killer,” Hana argued, unimpressed. 

“You really don’t think that’s evidence?” 

“Evidence of  _ what? _ That radios exist?”

The two wrapped up this segment before it could turn into a blown-out fight. It was still early in the night, but that just meant the two would bicker some more until sleep set in. If Lúcio could get to sleep, that is. The last time Jesse was cameraman for them, Lúcio only got an hour of sleep because he kept hearing things in the dark. 

“I’ll head out now,” Jesse said, once making sure that the night vision cameras were still recording and the mics were set up around the room. They had ditched the lav mics in favor of the camera mics and boom sticks, set up about the room to pick up any ‘supernatural’ noises. “You two all set?”

“We’re all good, Jess!” Hana gave him a thumbs up from the sleeping bag. As Jesse walked out, he heard Hana tease, “Can’t wait to get a good night’s sleep.” Followed by Lúcio’s despaired groan. 

The Shimada Castle grounds was much more eerie at night. Especially when a cool breeze went by and made Jesse’s skin buzz. There was a little more than unfounded ghost sightings here, Jesse knew by now, and he wasn’t sure if he wanted to stay like he had planned. 

He walked right up the steps under an arch and took a deep breath. The wood was solid beneath his feet; the moon high in the sky and illuminating the buildings, full and new like it was a hundred years earlier, the bell monument shining in the moonlight. 

Jesse felt a presence behind him. 

“You need to  _ GO _ \--” He was shoved  _ hard _ , sent stumbling down the steps. “--before  _ HE  _ comes.” 

When he regained his footing, Jesse turned to see empty air. He was alone, but not for long. There was a crackling in the air, barely noticeable, and the smell of ozone that startled Jesse at first. This was new, much too new for what he has already experienced in this field. 

Still, he forced himself to stay calm. Standing up, using a rock to steady himself, he looked across a yard that used to be a mess of sand earlier in the day. Now, it was raked into a neat zen garden, and Jesse had just scuffed the design. 

“I’m here to help,” Jesse said to the open air. “If you don’t want my help, that’s fine. I’m gonna close my eyes - if you want to talk, just take your time to appear.” 

He kept to his word. In his experience, you have to let the ghosts come to you. His own abilities can force the spirits to acknowledge him, but he can’t force them to accept his help. 

The only way to get solid communication is to meet them halfway. 

He allowed any spirit nearby to form solidly - they take any form of energy to appear, but it requires time. Jesse was a patient man. 

He opened his eyes after what he assumed was long enough, and was only partially surprised to see a man had appeared before him. Jesse was worried these particular spirits wouldn’t like to be bothered. 

The man was young, much younger than Jesse. He had short hair kept out of his face by a piece of cloth. He wore traditional clothing that Jesse recognized from his brief research of the time period. His wide eyes stared at Jesse with something akin to fear. 

“I told you to go,” He said. 

“And I offered to help.” Jesse couldn’t help notice how the man’s shape seem to waver. Even as a solid form, Jesse couldn’t tell what colors the man’s clothing or hair were. He was in an out of focus, as if he hadn’t committed to his appearance. 

“I don’t think you  _ can _ help,” The man argued. He looked over his shoulder. “He’ll hurt you.”

“Who?” 

The crackling in the air grew louder. The man flinched. “My brother.” 

“Is it Genji?”

The man blinked. “ _ I’m  _ Genji.” 

There was a crack, and a flash in the sky that reminded Jesse of lightning, even though he knew there was no chance for storms. The clouds above swirled; something bright and blue flew in and out of the dark sky. 

Genji was pushing him. “You need to  _ leave _ . You cannot help. I’m afraid he’ll kill you.” 

“I  _ can _ , I can help you if you let me.” Jesse gripped Genji’s wrists to keep from being shoved more, but Genji shook his head. 

“It’s not up to me,” He said. “It’s up to Hanzo.” 

As if speaking his name called his attention, the dragon in the sky let out an ear-piercing screech. It flew down from the swirling storm clouds, low to the ground, faster than a speeding motorcycle. Genji had disappeared, and Jesse was gripping onto empty air. The dragon was rushing at him, much larger than it appeared in the sky, its gaping maw opening to reveal rows and rows of teeth, an angry scream deafening against the raging storm ahead, and Jesse ducked, arms cowering over his face, and--

Like a switch, it fell silent. 

Hesitantly, Jesse opened his eyes. The zen garden was gone, replaced by the messy sand that hadn’t seen a rake in at least a decade. The wood creaked, the buildings were old like they should be. The sky was dark but clear. 

Jesse leaned against a wooden pillar and ran a hand down his face. Tried to steady his breathing. 

That was too close. 

This was different. 

His usual haunts were lost spirits looking for closure. Jesse provided that closure. But this? There was something else at play here. 

He wandered out of the castle doors, tucking his hands in his pocket and digging his phone out. He walked in the opposite direction of the hotel, and hoped there was some late night ramen shop still open. 

He had some research to do.

**Author's Note:**

> Might continue this one day, what did you guys think? 
> 
> Do you enjoy my work and want to support a fic writer?  
> [Buy me a coffee!](%E2%80%9Cko-fi.com/voidghost%E2%80%9D)


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